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Quick links to various main topics in my blog

Some interesting points arose from tonight's debate between Tim Darvill, Mike Parker Pearson, Mike Pitts and Julian Richards which was chaired by Andrew Lawson and hosted as part of Salisbury Museum's 150th Anniversary Conference.

I'll mention a few here, and if you want to hear the whole hour long thing I've a (poor quality) audio recording of it.

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Most importantly, I think it's worth saying that there are no hard and fast answers to be had here, but in terms of informed discussion this is as up to date info as you can get.

1) Aubrey Holes - bluestones or wooden posts - the opinion is still split. Mike Parker Pearson believes the bluestones arrived soon after 3000BC and were erected in the Aubrey Holes. Tim Darvill points out that AH7 held no bluestone chips, yet the Q&R holes (hitherto believed to be the earliest bluestone setting) did. Mike Pitts cites Hawley's original records of his early 20th C. excavation of the Aubrey Holes as indicating that they were stone holes and also mentions the Boscombe "Timber" Circle which is on the same scale as the Aubrey Hole circle and is now thought may have held stones. Julian Richards isn't convinced that the AH7 excavation indicates a stone hole - after all this particular hole has been excavated at least 3 times. All agree that an excavation of an untouched Aubrey Hole is needed.

2) MPP says we'll have a radiocarbon date as to when the bluestones were removed from West Amesbury Henge (discovered on the banks of the Avon in 2009) by Xmas 2010.

4) "The Boy with the Amber Necklace" - the one in the news this week - is almost certainly NOT from the Mediterranean, despite what the press have reported.

MPP explains the misunderstanding starting at 26:35 in the audio. At first glance by the British Geological Survey the oxygen isotope value compared closely with those of the Med. area, but the press release was prepared before the Beaker Isotope Project had reviewed the data, when it was found that this individual sits right in the middle of the Wessex Group. He's from Wessex.

5) There are an increasing number of solstitial-aligned monuments being found. Clive Ruggles has identified 8, and the Birmingham University project's discovery over the summer of the 'henge' under G51 makes nine. In passing, MPP suggests that G51 may be a robbed out stone circle mentioning the quantities of rhyolite found just to the east of it.

6) TD says that Stonehenge is one of a number of 'centres' at 25-30 mile distances from the south coast to the Orkneys, some smaller, other more significant with the Stonehenge 'centre' being exceptional both in terms of its size and longevity of use.

7) There's general agreement that Grooved Ware (or its regional equivalent) is strongly associated with the earliest phases of this type of ceremonial monument - the earthworks and Aubrey Hole circle, in Stonehenge's case.

8) MPP says the chronological construction sequence of the Southern Circle in Durrington Walls (looking back to Wainwright's archive together with new radiocarbon dating of antler picks from the original excavation) indicates the early large postholes date from 2900-2600BC and the whole structure has the same timespan of use as Stonehenge itself. He suggests that at the very centre there may have been a single wooden trilithon aligned on the midwinter solstice sunrise and that it cuts into an even earlier circle.

9) D-shaped buildings may be a new style of neolithic structure that we've not paid enough attention to before. Upper Ninepiece (Powys), the Ness of Brodgar (Orkney) and Durrington Walls all have these structures - and the one at Durrington Walls is a horseshoe structure right at the centre of the Southern Circle.

11) On the question of whether Stonehenge was ever 'finished', TD feels it was more of a continuous evolution. The Romans messed about with Stonehenge to a greater extent that we'd realised. They dug down alongside existing stones, perhaps created a temple, and antiquarian records talk of 'curse tablets' being found. MPP expands on this topic and mentions Stone 11 - the half-height sarsen in the sarsen circle that's too short to support a lintel. It's not dressed like the other sarsens, so was it added later? MP thinks that 'finished' really means the completion of the sarsen structure around 2500BC and points out that the attempts by people to 'out-do' their forebears in embellishing Stonehenge stops around this time.

12) Finally, Julian Richards asks the others what they think they'd see if they were at Stonehenge in midwinter 2400BC. Tim Darvill reckons lots of people, probably psyched up, certainly inebriated, some of whom have come very long distances, performing special ceremonies and expecting the deity of Stonehenge to be there to commune with them.